Simulation and modeling software are used throughout the oil & gas industry for exploration, appraisal, development and production of oil fields. In addition, visualization tools incorporated into or external to such software are used to display and manipulate representations of petroleum reservoirs that are modelled as large volumes subdivided into cells. Models continue to get increasingly more complex, however, and may include millions of cells or more, which can present difficulties when attempting to generate visualizations due to the large volume of information encompassed within the millions of cells and the computing overhead associated with generating visualizations therefrom. These difficulties are further exacerbated for three-dimensional representations and/or interactive representations that enable a user to modify the visualization in real-time (e.g., by zooming in/out, changing the viewpoint, etc.). Furthermore, whereas many reservoir models are based upon structured grids comprised of regular arrays of cubic cells, reservoir modeling is increasingly relying on unstructured volumetric grids to provide a more accurate and detailed modeling of complex subsurface features, and the calculations associated with unstructured volumetric grids can further increase the computing overhead associated with generating visualizations. A need therefore exists for a manner of reducing the computing overhead associated with generating visualizations for unstructured volumetric grids.